We ended our diet unofficially and without fan-fare on Sunday, June 29th. Sunday was the culmination of World Pride in Toronto, so we decided to buy a Pride and a Canada Day cupcake at the Loblaws in the Village at Church and Carleton.

I was surprised but pleased that we only ate two, small cupcakes. The entire week before pride Christiaan was adamant that he was going to buy a big cake and eat the entire thing on Canada Day.

Instead of over doing it we really enjoyed something small. We both felt it react in our stomach in a slightly uncomfortable way after eating dinner.

Does this happen to you:

If you go without eating sweets for a long time does your body react when you eat dessert again?

In my case I could feel my stomach, not so much “turning”, but it was an almost sickly feeling in response to the sugar and the low-quality saturated fat from the icing.

Was it worth it?

Absolutely!

Psychologically it felt good to allow myself a dessert.

We can choose to make ourselves do anything but we also need to know when to take a break from strict, healthy habits.

Taking a break is not license to give up on the new habit, rather it’s an opportunity to allow ourselves to be human and to enjoy life.

On Canada Day (Tuesday, July 1st) we went for a long walk and enjoyed a delicious ice cream from Summer’s Ice Cream in Toronto’s Yorkville.

We talked about the experience of not having desserts for over a month. We had two family outings in May where dessert was served and we allowed ourselves to indulge.

What was most important to us was that we didn’t cheat at any other time.

However, we both felt that after eating the two cupcakes, then the ice cream on Tuesday (and whoops — I forgot the Starbucks Frappuccino we had on Monday!), it was clear that it is far too easy to slide back into eating desserts on a regular basis.

We’ve decided going forward to limit desserts to no more than once per week. I’ve lost the taste (and the craving) for desserts and I feel so much better physically and energetically (I wrote about this in my No Desserts Diet Update), that I don’t want to return to my previous state of discomfort.

I really didn’t do anything different for my level of activity during that period and most importantly I didn’t lose any muscle mass — in fact it increased by 0.2 pounds.

These measurements are incredibly important because they demonstrate just how big of an impact dietary change makes on body composition.

I look great. I feel that I look better. My stomach hasn’t been cramped in over a month and I’ve only felt bloated on the two family outings when we both ate a lot at dinner, which we followed with dessert.

PS: I lied. I cheated. I am soooo ashamed!

One night last week I was craving chocolate. It was intense — the kind of craving that felt like my body was missing something that it desperately needed. It wasn’t sugar I was craving, rather I wanted dark chocolate, even cocoa.

We had a box of Purdy’s miniature Hedgehogs in the fridge that my parents gave me for Christmas. Yes, I had a single hedgehog left over from December!

I took out the box and ate the hedgehog. It was delicious and it completely satisfied my craving.

But I didn’t want to tell Christiaan! So I put the empty box on top of the fridge way at the back, thinking this was better than putting the box in the recycling. He’s a tall guy and upon walking into the kitchen he said, “Did you eat the last hedgehog?”